Space Forum / Space History / March 2004

Hi,

I am achieving a big file about the history of ham radio.
I would like to know if someone could provide me any information, recording
or picture about the "Torre Bert" station and "Zeus" space tracking network
that was setup between 1960-1965 in Italy ?
All info is welcome using the form available on my website.

Thanks in advance

73
Thierry, ON4SKY
http://www.astrosurf.com/lombry

Here is a short information extracted from my website (info not published
yet).

Torre Bert and the Zeus network

In Italy for example, by the end of 1960, two young Turino brothers fan of
ham radio, Achille and Gian Battista Judica-Cordiglia setup the first
amateur tracking station "Torre Bert". Their golad was to picked up the
first telemetry signals and other downlinks messages from the first
satellites launched by Russia then by NASA. A first in all fields !

While Jodrell Bank had invested 1.6 million sterling pounds to track
satellites, that USAF spent 15 millions dollars at Tyngsboro, MA, and that a
Turino industrial built a parabolic dish at 2 millions lira, our two young
amateurs had only 18,000 lira. So the only solution was to build themselves
the equipment. With an extraordinary ingenuity they achieved their objective
in a couple of years and were able to track any satellite passing nearby. In
1965 they created the Zeus network that counted 17 stations spread over the
world. Their installation was so sophisticated that there were able to
forecast 12 hours ahead that Lunik IV launched by Russian to the Moon should
miss its target from 8000 km. In fact it flew 8497 km from the Moon.

During its short existence, Torre Bert recorded some sensational messages
from space. On November 28, 1960 for example they picked up this enigmatic
message : "SOS TO ALL WORLD". The message was transmitted from a spacecraft
in movement and was sent three times. Amateurs in Germany and Texas received
the same message. Three days later, Russian recognized that one of their
launches failed, but they didn't make allusion to a human passenger. A
similar recording was picked up on May 17, 1961 coming from a crew of
several cosmonauts. Nobody will never know what happened as long as Russian
will not decide to speak. A third message was recorded on February 1961.
Presented to the famous hearth surgeon Dr Dogliotti, he affirmed that we
heard the fast beating of a dying hearth. The brothers were convinced that
Russian didn't shrink from sacrifying human lifes to affirm their mastering
of space.

In 1964, after have won 1,8 millions lira at a TV-game dealing with the
space conquest, our young Turino visited the USA and the various space
centers of Alabama, Florida, Maryland and Texas, where they did the
admiration of American engineers by the extent of their know-how. Slowly
hams were preparing their entry in the world of space communication.

Thierry, ON4SKY